By Chris Williams: 29-year-old former IBF featherweight champion Evgeny Gradovich (20-1-1, 9 KOs) will be taking a tune-up fight in slightly less than two weeks from now against little known Jesus Galicia (13-8-1, 8 KOs) in a catch-weight fight at 128lbs in a 10 round fight at the Centro Deportivo Boxing Unitres, Picanya, Comunidad Valenciana, Spain.
If Gradovich wins this fight, he could wind up facing WBO super bantamweight champion Nonito Donaire in his next fight if he doesn’t take too much punishment in beating Galicia.
With Gradovich, you can’t really assume that he’s going to get through any fight without taking a terrible beating to the face because that’s much what happens with all of his fights. I would be surprised if Gradovich gets through this fight without suffering a cut, even though he’s facing a 2nd tier fighter that isn’t in his class. Gradovich doesn’t have a lot of punching power to get any of his opponents out of there, so he’s likely going to need to work hard to get the win.
“I heard about that but nothing for sure, maybe later but right now nothing,” Gradovich said to RingTV.com.
The Gradovich vs. Donaire fight could take place on April 16th or 23rd, if Gradovich doesn’t get busted up badly by Galicia. Like I said, you can’t assume that Gradovich will get through any fight without taking punishment.
It would be tough for Gradovich to try and melt down from 126 to fight Donaire at 122. It’s a move that makes sense for Gradovich, however, because he can’t crack eggs at featherweight, and he might have a bit more punching power if he can drain down to super bantamweight. If Gradovich doesn’t wind up weakened from the process of dropping weight, he should be a better fighter than he’s been at featherweight.
We saw how the light hitting pressure fighter Cesar Juarez almost beat Donaire in their fight this month on December 11th in San Juan, Puerto Rico. If a limited light hitting pressure fighter like Juarez almost beat the 33-year-old Donaire, then Gradovich might have more than enough to wear Donaire down and knock him out if he can put enough pressure on him.
“I want [to] try first time how I will feel in 122 but they want make me fight against Donaire and nobody wants [to] give me [a tune-up] fight [at] 122,” Gradovich said to RingTV.com. “That’s why I don’t know.”
Gradovich definitely needs to take a tune-up at 122 before he faces Donaire in this weight class, because the last thing he needs is another loss like the one he suffered against Lee Selby earlier this year in May. Gradovich took a pounding in getting stopped in the 8th round of that fight and losing his IBF featherweight title.
Donaire is a natural super bantamweight, so he’s going to have an advantage over Gradovich unless the Russian fighter’s punching power is better in this weight class than it was at featherweight. I still think Donaire will be the better puncher than Gradovich. As such, the Russian fighter will need to really pressure Donaire to have a chance at winning the fight.
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